Smaller is Better for Army UAS

The US Army wants to increase dramatically the number of small unmanned aircraft in the hands of its solders (you can read Amy Butler's story here). Where now there are 17 RQ-11 Ravens in a brigade combat team (BCT), the Army plans to increase this to 49 "family of systems" SUAS.

Initially the family will comprise AeroVironment's 4.2lb Raven plus its bigger 13lb Puma and smaller 0.95lb Wasp, but the Army has its eye on a new family of systems. And it could be big business.

Photo: AeroVironment

Speaking at an AUVSI conference in DC this week, Lt Col James Cutting, aviation UAS director in the Army's operations office, explained the need for more SUAS, saying a look at Afghanistan shows dozens of places within a BCT's area of operations that need surveillance "and there will never be enough multi-million-dollar systems to cover them."

Putting small UAVs into the hands of individual soldiers as "flying binoculars" so they can surveil their own areas supports the Army's "mission command" C2 concept under which understanding of the battlefield is built from the bottom up, says Glenn Rizzi, senior adviser at the Army's Training and Doctrine Command. But it puts new demands on SUAS design.

According to Cutting, the Army wants to push UAVs down to engineer, armor and infantry units and not form more aviation units, which come with overhead. SUAS must become easier to use, and the training less unwieldy. They have to be "simple to operate, so you don't have to read the instructions", says Rizzi.

In the Army's eyes, the "optimum SUAS" for its new family of systems weighs from 2-15lb, flies for 20min-2hr, is hand-launched or VTOL, and is cheap enough to be considered expendable. Hover, perch and stare capability is desirable and the SUAS must be quiet, but "with the ability to make it loud when when you need to."